


work

by foxmagpie



Series: little gifts [17]
Category: Good Girls (TV)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, F/M, Rio POV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-06
Updated: 2019-08-06
Packaged: 2020-08-10 03:55:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,089
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20128942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foxmagpie/pseuds/foxmagpie
Summary: Rio reacts to his and Beth's fight by disappearing to Legoland with Marcus. Borrows heavily from 2x12 to get us into Rio's head as he processes everything.





	work

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you all so much for your WONDERFUL feedback on the last chapter. You're all so kind and I appreciate it SO much, especially since I've been nervous about this arc—but I think these two nightmares need to go through it!

Rio pulls into Elena’s driveway on Sunday morning for the switch-off. She’s got a li’l two bedroom house in a nice neighborhood, a place with a yard where Rio sometimes kicks around a soccer ball with Marcus. 

He’d prolly like her house if every single thing inside it was different. Elena’s one of them real homey types. He passes some ugly li’l garden gnomes on the front porch and lets himself into the front hallway where she’s got a destressed wood sign with “Live, Laugh, Love” painted on it—and each fuckin’ word is a different font. Rio’s given her tons of shit for being so goddamn tacky, and as payback she’d once gotten him a _ Bless This Mess _ pillow. He’d promptly regifted it back to her—and she’d actually put it on her couch.

“Elena? Estoy aquí,” he calls as he slips off his shoes. 

“Morning,” she says, walking out of the kitchen and drying her hands on a towel. “Marcus should be back from his sleepover with Logan in a minute.” Logan’s his li’l next-door-neighbor buddy, Marcus’s own version of Martín, back when that didn’t mean what it does now. “I was making some pancakes and eggs, ¿los quieres?”

“Nah, actually—”

“Tea, then?”

He eyes her and sees that she’s carryin’ some nervousness. She’s still dryin’ her hands even though they clearly ain’t wet anymore. 

“What’s goin’ on, Elena?”

“I wanted to talk to you about something.” She exhales. “I’m… seeing someone.”

Rio gives her a small grin. He’d already figured this out, but she’s always fussy about having this conversation. She shouldn't be. He’s happy for her—but he don’t really wanna talk about this right now.

“That’s cool, amorcita. But—”

“Thank you,” she says, cutting him off without realizing in her jittery state. Her words spill out of her in a rush. “Actually, I was wondering if you’d have dinner with us on Friday, so, um, I could introduce Marcus to Alex on Saturday? I know that’s it’s a really quick turnaround, and that’s it’ll technically be your weekend—but he won tickets to a Red Wings game, and since Marcus recently got into hockey—you know? I was even thinking maybe... maybe you’d wanna bring Elizabeth to dinner?”

His eyebrows arch in surprise. He didn’t know she knew Elizabeth’s name, and Elena knows exactly what he’s thinking.

“Sonia told me about the Christmas car commercial-slash-Facebook stalking debacle,” Elena admits. Suddenly her tone switches to judgmental. “_And _ that you skipped the last two family meals afterward? Are you avoiding them because they figured out who she was?” 

“Nah, I just had a lot of work shit goin’ on.” 

And he had—his ma’s twice-monthly family dinner night landed on one of the few nights of the week he didn’t have nonstop drops going on lately, playing catch-up. He’d been spending ‘em teaching Elizabeth how to shoot instead. Fuckin’ A, it irks him now. She was shit with a gun so far, and things were so tense between ‘em she wasn’t making much progress, but he’d kept making those meetings happen anyway, making it a priority. Really, he just couldn’t stop himself from wanting to be around her even though he was pissed. Couldn’t stop himself from wanting to touch her even when he had trouble looking at her. 

Shit, how had this gotten so outta control? 

He’d believed Dean, that’s why. It wasn’t even so much about how Dean had told him that Elizabeth had said they were just sex—he’s had enough of it to know what’s _ just _ sex and what’s more, and things had been _ more _ since Elizabeth had invited him into her bedroom. Instead, it’d been this gut reaction, and before he knew it he was pushing her away before she could leave.

_I mean, she’s got 40 years of history playing June Cleaver, right? And her kids are gonna get older and smarter and when that happens—Bonnie’s gonna hang up her hat … So, Clyde, how interested are you really going to be in her when she goes back to being PTA Mom of the Month?_

_She’s scratching an itch. You’re kidding yourself if you think that she’s going to choose your whole lifestyle over what she’s always known. She’ll get scared and come running back to safety. _

The lines had been blurred with Elizabeth, and he’d been breakin’ all his rules, but he’d been coming around to acceptin’ that—’til he thought she might cut and run. He’d wanted her too much—_ all _ of her—so that doubt had eaten at him and he’d almost fucked it all up. 

Then it had gotten sorted for about five fuckin’ minutes last night, until a switch had been flipped and all these things came boilin’ over. Elizabeth had spilled them at his feet, accusin’ him of being no better than her piece of shit husband, and then she’d turned on her heel and _ left. _

Rio’s still trying to sort out what the fuck happened.

He needs a break from this shit. 

“Okay,” Elena says skeptically. “But what do you say? Friday? C’mon. We can get a sitter, and it’ll be easier for her to meet me than your sisters—I’m a delight!”

Rio doesn’t laugh at her cheesin’ and talkin’ herself up, and her expression shifts from amused to cautious. 

Besides the fact that there was no reality in which he would wanna double date with his baby mama, Friday night was impossible. That was the night Elizabeth was meetin’ up with that dweeby li’l toy and hobby guy.

Man, f’real, he was completely baffled by the disparity between her and the type of dudes she’d been with. 

“Sorry, Friday night's no good."

“I suppose we could try to make it work earlier in the week—?" 

“Can we please pause for a sec? I need to talk to you about something.”

Elena stops running the towel through her fingers. “What’s up?”

“I’m pullin’ Marcus out of school for the week.”

“¿Qué? Why?”

“I’m takin’ him to Legoland.”

“In Auburn Hills? Chris, it’s a 45 minute drive. The whole _ week_? Take him on a day trip—”

“Nah. Uh. The one in Florida.”

Elena throws her hands into the air and her eyes start buggin’. “What the hell, Chris?”

“Es mejor. The Auburn Hills one is nothin’.”

“That’s not—you can’t just—”

“I know. I should’ve talked to you. And you can be pissed at me. But I already got the plane tickets and—and he’s six, Elena. He ain’t gonna remember missin’ no week of school from first grade.”

Running her hand through her hair, she paces back and forth. “I don’t even know how to react right now.” 

“Look, I’ll exchange our plane tickets, make sure we get back Thursday night, a’ight? We’ll do lunch on Friday? Y’all can do the hockey game on Saturday. I don’t care about switchin’ around the days.”

Elena puts her hand to her forehead like she can barely keep up with him. “I mean—I _ guess _?”

“Good.” He steps toward her and presses a kiss to her forehead. “Thanks.”

Elena waves her hands in front of her body to get him to give her his space. “That’s not the end of that conversation! I mean, are you bringing Elizabeth? Are you going to apologize for suddenly declaring you’re taking our son out of _ state _ during your week? Are you going to tell me _ what in the world prompted this?” _

Marcus barges through the door and attacks Rio at the knees. Logan’s mom pops her head in to say hi and bye in the time it takes Rio to run his hand over Marcus’s head and lean down to kiss him on his temple. 

“Hey, pop. Missed you.”

“Missed you!” Marcus says.

Rio looks up at Elena, asking her permission to tell Marcus. She rolls her eyes, but gives a terse nod. 

“I got a surprise for you.”

Marcus pump his fist and cheers when he hears the news—he even remembers that Harry Potter World is in Florida—asks if they can go get a butterbeer, too.

“Anything you want, pop. Go fill a bag with the toys you wanna bring, yeah?” Marcus darts back to his bedroom and Rio calls after him: “Nothin’ too big!”

Elena’s tapping her foot with crossed arms when Rio turns back to face her. “Well?”

Rio wets his lips. “I don’t think Elizabeth will be comin’ to lunch.”

Elena searches his face, connecting his comment to his spur-of-the-moment Florida trip.

“Oh.” Elena reaches her arm out to his shoulder. “I’m sorry. Is it—is it over?”

Rio shrugs, unsure, glancing back at the hallway leading to Marcus’s bedroom.

“You know, I’m sure it’s salvageable—if you just communic—”

“Nah, we ain’t doin’ this,” Rio says, shaking his head. 

“Nuh uh. You do not get to be all cagey about this when _ you _ just dropped the Legoland bomb on me, alright? Jesus, if this is how you act with her—”

Rio knows he’s on shaky ground with Elena right now, but he ain’t about to dissect this with her—especially when he _ had _ tried talkin’ shit through for once only for it to end up fuckin’ worse than before. 

Rio’s saved from the rest of the conversation when Marcus bounds back into the room with a backpack full of toys. Rio shoots Elena a curt nod, and she rolls her eyes, exasperated. Then he and Marcus are off. 

* * *

Legoland is dope. They stay at the Legoland Hotel in the Kingdom themed room. The decorating style’s a li’l much for him—the wallpaper is made to look like old brick castle walls, and they got li’l coats of armor hanging everywhere—but he’s got his own bed and Marcus claims the top bunk in the kid’s area. Marcus holds royal court over their breakfasts and on the first day there was even a Welcome Treasure Hunt and a li’l Lego prize that Marcus ends up carryin’ around the whole trip like the Holy Grail. 

They do everything. They hit up lots of the different lands—Pirates Cove, Land of Adventure, and The Lego Movie World—and also the gardens and the water park. 

It’s sunshiney every day. It’s nice to be outta the cold wet winter weather of Detroit, and Rio’s having a good time because Marcus is having a goddamn blast. He snaps lots of photos, sends ‘em to Elena, and she sends back thumbs up emojis—letting him know she’s still a little pissed about him shutting her out, but that she’s mostly forgiven him for his co-parenting transgression.

And then on Tuesday he starts getting the messages from Elizabeth.

The first one’s simple. He checks it while he stands outside Marcus’s bathroom stall at the Legoland botanical gardens.

“Hi. It’s… me. Beth. Call me back, please. Immediately, actually, would be good.” There’s an awkward pause and then an, “Okay, bye.”

He’s itchin’ to call back, but he’s still ticked off about their fight and he sorta relishes makin’ her wait.

When Marcus unlocks the door and comes out, Rio slips his phone in his jeans in order to boost him up to reach the sink, and then he and Marcus finish walkin’ around the gardens. There’s all sorts of Lego models of old Southern Belles all over the benches, and there are these cool old cypress trees that look nothin’ like anything they got in Detroit. They even spot a few gators in the marshes, which makes Marcus go crazy ‘cause he thinks they look kinda like dinosaurs. 

It’s is the worst fuckin’ place to be when Elizabeth’s call is burning a hole in his pocket, though, because there are flowers everywhere. Some he recognizes from her garden, others from her blouses, and shit—who knew plants could get him so bent out of shape? 

By the time Rio tucks Marcus into bed that night, he’s got three more messages from her. He listens to each one, and she gets increasingly frantic and frazzled. She don’t say it, but he assumes she’s callin’ about their fight—and maybe Elena had been right about the salvageable thing. 

But the last message is long, and he listens to it as he’s brushing his teeth.

“Hi. It’s me again. So... I’m just gonna say this because I don’t know if you’re, like, in a meeting or something but... we have a little bit of a problem. I mean, it’s not a problem _ yet _ but it is definitely a situation. So you know that… jacket… you wanted us to get rid of a while back? We may have thrown away the wrong jacket. And we obviously need to find the right one before someone else does. So if you could call me back so we could discuss this matter in more detail that would be—” She cuts herself off and Rio hears Dean murmur in the background. She comes back on the phone to say, “Okay. Thank you.”

His jaw is tight as he listens to it again—twice more on speakerphone, ‘til he can faintly make out what the murmur is. He’s pretty fuckin sure he hears Dean say “Beth? It’s time to tell the kids I’m moving out.”

He doesn’t call back.

* * *

He’s agitated on Wednesday. It’s the day Marcus had begged to go to Harry Potter World, and it could be fun—a nice old lady takes a picture of him and Marcus by the train, and they go into the wand shop and see this whole spectacle of the wand choosin’ the wizard and shit—but his phone keeps buzzing and he just keeps thinkin’ about how she _ lied _ to him. 

She hadn’t killed Boomer. She hadn’t done shit. She’d even disposed of the wrong fuckin’ body? How the fuck? 

One of his boys had been cuttin’ off the fingers and ears of some other guy, but who the fuck was it? 

And that didn’t even begin to cover the can of worms this opened up. He had to assume if Boomer wasn’t in that bag, it was because he was alive. Now Rio didn’t just have to find the regional manager the cops had hidden in witness protection, he had to find the guy pretendin’ to be fuckin’ dead. 

And of course that ginger from Harry Potter’s all over the goddamn theme park, and he can’t help but think of when he’d come over to her house and learned she’d programmed him in her phone as _ Ron. _He’d left her a bottle of bourbon that night, and she’d told him about how her husband had found it, and he’d gloated a bit, thinkin’ about it. 

His fingers twitch in his pocket thinkin’ about it now as he watches Marcus run around Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes. He’d been fightin’ for her to end things with that dumbass this whole time, and _ now _ it had finally happened? Dean wasn’t about to roll over like that, so he knows this means Elizabeth finally bossed up with him—which means Elizabeth got heated about his methods, then _ used _‘em. 

Rio’s phone buzzes again and Marcus looks at it expectantly while they stand in line to buy big ol’ box of those awful beans. Rio clicks the phone off, and he tries not to think about her while he and Marcus take turns tellin’ each other what nasty flavors they try as they walk around the park.

* * *

Voicemail number 25 on Thursday morning is: “Maybe you didn’t totally get it, but I wasn’t actually talking about a jacket. Hel—?” She gets cut off. 

Lots of the messages accuse him of not listenin’ to her, which makes him grit his teeth. He’s listened to every single one and he’d even gotten onto the Delta Airlines website twice this week to look at changin’ his plane tickets before he’d come to his senses. 

He stops deleting the messages so that she’ll stop leaving them. Eventually, he figures the box will fill up. Turns out 25 messages is the cap.

She’s relentless, though. When the mailbox is full, Elizabeth switches to texts.

_ It’s on you, too. _

Don't she fuckin’ know he knows that? 

He’s furious at her audacity—Elizabeth’s pissed because he was trying to clean up her messes, and here she was callin’ him askin’ him to swoop in and save her? To take care of something she’d pretended she’d taken care of this whole time? 

Jesus, the whole thing had been the trigger point for them gettin’ together, too—she’d let him believe she’d killed Boomer, and he’d handed her the keys to the kingdom just to see what she’d make of herself. It’d only been a couple of days and then she’d showed up at his bar twirlin’ her hair around his finger, shootin’ him those glances—fuck, she’d been so _ loud_, and suddenly it hadn't been just a game anymore. 

She’d made him think that she got her hands dirty, that she’d crossed the threshold. That was it for him—the thing that made him lose all control with her, lose sight of the fact that he had rules for a _ reason. _

Shit. Elizabeth’s sister and her dumbass husband were right, though—all this just proved she was never gonna commit to this life.

He’d been wrong about her.

* * *

When their plane lands on Thursday evening, Rio drives a conked out Marcus over to Elena’s. He tells her a work thing came up unexpectedly, and she looks at him with worry. She asks if everything is okay, and he lies and says that it is. 

Then he goes to Elizabeth’s. 

_ Outside_, he texts when he parks in front of her place. 

There’s a several minute delay before she responds, and this irritates him. He’d expected her to be glued to her phone, waitin’ to see if he would ever deign to respond.

_ I don’t see you? _ She must’ve gone to the backyard, searched for him in his usual place in the dark. 

But things are different now. He’s meetin’ her on his turf.

_ Out front_.

From the rearview mirror. Rio sees her burst through her front door and stomp haughtily on the sidewalk toward him, arms swingin’. He hears her rip open the passenger door, but he refuses to look over at her. He just stares straight ahead, can just make out some neighbors up ahead walkin’ a dog. 

“What’s up?” he asks. 

“Did you get my messages?” 

Rio can feel Elizabeth’s eyes on him: he can tell she’s all angled toward him, too. He’s got her complete focus, and he knows he’s gotta keep a tight grip on his reactions.

“Yeah. I’m here, right?”

“I left 15,” she lies smoothly, but he knows it’s more than twice that.

“Yeah, and a few with the emojis eyes crossed out.” He looks out the driver’s side window and chuckles. He knows pretendin' everything's fine is gettin’ under her skin, but it’s nothin’ compared to the fury he’s keepin’ under wraps. 

“Where were you?” 

“I was at Legoland,” he says, and he finally rolls his head back on the headrest and looks at her. Her eyes are wide and stormy. 

“Are you serious?”

“Yeah. It’s a really nice place.” The calmer he is, the more he small talks at her, the more bothered Elizabeth becomes. 

“You went on _ vacation_?” 

“Yeah, with my kid.” Jesus, she loved pullin’ the mother card, if she even dared to complain about it, he had no problem pullin’ his own card here. 

“Sounds fun!” she spits acerbically. 

“Yeah, yeah, it’s real dope,” he says, like she’s interested in hearin’ about it. “You know, everything is Lego there. They got a Lego Vegas Strip, Golden Gate Bridge.” 

Unable to keep lookin’ at her, he turns back toward the street—but he ain’t seein’ what’s in front of him. Just what’s at the periphery. 

“I’m about to be arrested for murder!” 

He purses his lips, then laughs at her because if he don’t, he’ll lose his shit on her. It’s funny how little she wants to take responsibility for her own actions. Failin’ to deal with her rotten eggs, failin’ to deal with her own failures—ignorin’ every lesson he’d tried to instill in her. 

This is just the consequences of her own sloppy way of handlin’ things. 

“That sucks.” 

“And you couldn’t return a text?”

“Hey, I don’t work while on vacation.” He looks at her again, wants to see her face as she reacts to that.

Elizabeth blinks at him, swallowing his words. Her mouth gapes a bit, and then she glares at him. “That’s what I am? Work?”

She’s real mad about bein’ work friends now—but shit, that’s all she’d wanted to talk to him about, right? She’d called him 30 fuckin’ times, and she didn’t say shit about anythin’ _ ‘cept _ work. 

It don’t matter, though. They can’t go back. He’d thought they could be somethin’, that he could have somethin’ with someone that understood all his boxes, but it ain’t her. 

“Pretty much, yeah.” He can’t even look at her when he says it. 

He looks up to gauge her reaction, and it’s a quiet fury, somethin’ that makes him wanna shift in his seat.

“That’s it?”

“That’s it,” he says, and he looks out toward the street again, and the neighbors with the dog are gone. 

They both know it ain’t true—he hasn’t been hidin’ anythin’ from her. Shit, he’d never felt as exposed as when he’d felt her nails dig into his skin and she’d forced him to look her in the eye that last time they were together in this same car. He’d been goin’ fast and rough with her, but he felt himself losin’ his grip lookin’ in her eyes. Even worse: the second he’d felt her lips on his, he’d spasmed inside of her like he had no control over himself. 

It doesn’t matter that it’s a lie—that’s what it’s gotta be now. She doesn’t challenge him on it. 

“Oh? And one thing you should know? Your money’s _ cooked_. The feds know everything. Welcome back, _ boss_.” 

God fucking dammit. Rio wants to slash a tire or get into a fight or somethin’. In all those messages, she hadn’t thought to mention _ this_? He should end it all—she ain’t nothin’ but a goddamn liability, she’s done nothin’ but cause him trouble, but—

“_Boss_, huh? Nah, sweetheart, we partners. If the money’s cooked, it affect me as much as you.”

Even if he really wanted to—even if he really was really ready to cut her loose—he can’t. He’d introduced her to Fusil and Kostra as his partner, had even vouched to Fusil that there wasn’t gonna be no problems with their arrangement. He ain’t about to sacrifice his reputation ‘cause she’s a pain in his ass.

Whipping around to stare at him, Elizabeth’s expression is one of disdain. 

“You know what that means, right?” 

“What?” she spits.

“You had to make that Kostra deal happen _ yesterday_.” He clicks his teeth at her. “We got lost income to make up, and you gotta figure out some other way to pay me back the debts you still workin’ off.”

Elizabeth opens and closes her mouth, dumbfounded.

“I’ll see you at your meetin’ tomorrow, yeah?” 

“Excuse me?”

“I mean, you droppin’ the ball, sweetheart. Buryin’ the wrong bodies and leavin’ evidence behind at your husband’s dealership. I mean, I’m just assumin’ that’s how the feds found out about the money.” He gives her a pointed look and she casts her eyes away from his. 

“It’s not exactly like I had much of a heads up before the raid.”

“I remember callin’. Sucks when people don’t answer, right?”

Elizabeth gapes at him. 

“So I’m just sayin’. I gotta make sure there ain’t any more mistakes. So I’ll be droppin’ by to make sure sure everythin’ runnin’ the way it should.”

Turning the key in the ignition, he signals that he’s ready for her to get out of his car. 

* * *

Rio pounds on the door with his free hand. The other one’s holdin’ a bottle of scotch and two cigars. The lights are all off in the house, but that’s never been a problem before. 

A light flicks on from the back hallway—he can see its glow permeate the living room—and the door swings open to reveal Jen. She leans against the doorframe. She’s wearing those little underwear that look kinda like briefs and a thin tank over her thin frame and tiny tits. Her long brown hair hangs perfectly straight halfway down her back. Rio watches as her nipples harden—maybe from the cold, maybe under his gaze. She notices his eyeline and she crosses her arms, smirking. 

“It’s been a while,” Rio drawls.

“Yeah. I texted you,” she reminds him, looking up at him. She’s shorter—5’4” at most. 

“Yeah, I know.” He sucks his teeth, remembers ignoring that text before he’d had that tickin’ time bomb conversation with Dean. “I come bearin’ gifts.” 

Rio shakes the bottle of scotch back and forth and slides a cigar into his mouth from between his fingers.

Jen smiles. 

* * *

As soon as Jen lets Rio cross the threshold, he’s got his lips on her, his tongue in her mouth. She meets him with equal tenacity. 

They’ve always had good sex, him and Jen. 

They’d met way back when. She used to work at a convenience store he’d used to wash cash, back when his ops were much smaller. Jen was always blowin’ bubble gum and eye fuckin’ him every time he came to swap out the fake for the real. One day she followed him into the office where the safe was, and they’d been hookin’ up in random intervals ever since. 

She never asked about the duffel bags. Never asked about the gun on his hip. Never asked why they didn’t go to his place. 

Jen was smart but disinterested—they were attracted to each other but not particularly curious about each other. 

He no longer uses that store, and she doesn’t work there anymore. He thinks she works in a lab or somethin’ now, but he ain’t sure. To say they didn’t talk about personal stuff was an understatement. 

Rio likes her, though; he respects her for her complete lack of interest in bein' bound to other people’s perceptions of her. She was just fine bein’ the type of person that fucked near-strangers on the clock, but she was also the kind of person whose version of pillow talk was babblin’ about whatever recent documentary she’d just watched. 

Jen tells him all about a military coup in Indonesia she’s just learned about as he eats her out on the couch. She gets breathy and loses her train of thought as he coaxes two orgasms out of her. 

She tastes almost as sweet.

Afterward, they drink the scotch and share one of the cigars on the back porch. 

She leads him to her bedroom once they’re good and drunk, and it might be different than last time. Maybe some nicer furniture is in here now, but he can’t really remember. It's been a while. 

Jen expects him to handle her roughly—lets him know she wants it, even. She gets him pressed against a wall and she tries to hook her leg up around his hip. He puts his hands around her ass in order to hike her up so that her legs can wrap around his waist. 

“Fuck me against the wall?” she asks breathily.

The bar bathroom flashes through his head, and he quickly says, “Nah.”

Instead, he’s gentle with her. He lays her on her back on the soft mattress, and then he crawls on top of her. 

Jen’s body should be familiar to him as rubs one hand over her and dips the other into her panties, but all he can think about is how different it feels as she writhes under him enthusiastically. 

There are more sharp edges under his lips as he kisses down her sinewy frame. There’s barely anythin’ to palm on her chest, so he just tongues her nipple ‘til her back arches. Her skin is smooth and unblemished from stretch marks and C-section scars. He also forgets how ticklish she is when he tries to kiss her neck, but while he’s there he smells her hair—something peachy instead of lavender.

Rio kisses her for a long time, touching her all over. 

He tries to memorize her. 

He tries to forget.

Still. It’s not enough. 

Rio pulls out a condom and then he buries himself in her. Jen’s the type to smile in her pleasure, sometimes even to giggle, and she does when her eyes flutter shut while she peaks. 

Rio keeps his eyes open, though—locked on her. If he closes them, he knows he’ll be lost. 

* * *

“That was different,” Jen says when he rolls off of her.

"You pretendin' it wasn't good for you? 'Cause I still got your cum on my cock, sweetheart." He grins at her, then gets up from the bed to head to the bathroom and throw away the condom. 

Jen's pulled out the second cigar by the time he comes back. He stands naked at the end of her bed, and she blows a puff of smoke up towards the ceiling and says, "I didn't say that."

Rio doesn’t ask her what she means, but she tells him anyway.

“I don’t give a shit if you’re thinking about someone else.” Jen sits up and hands the cigar to him. He takes a drag. “I do it, too.”

Rio coughs out, “The fuck?” 

Jen laughs. “Does that bother you?”

“That you thinkin’ about another dude when I’m fuckin’ you? Shit. Kinda.” Rio doesn't really give a rat's ass. He should, he guesses, as a matter of pride, but he can't muster up the energy. She ain't the one he wants to be thinkin' about him. He sees the opportunity, though. “Guess it just means I gotta work harder, huh?”

“Yeah? Think that’ll do it? You gonna forget about your girl?”

Rio looks down and lets his eyes devour Jen’s body. She never blushes—just looks self-satisfied. He crawls back onto the bed, right on top of her, and bites her shoulder.

“Let’s see.”

So they go for round two. This time Rio doesn’t let her finish until she’s moaning his name, but it doesn't matter. The only name on the tip of his tongue is still _Elizabeth._

**Author's Note:**

> [Rio and Marcus's room as Lego Land](https://www.legoland.com/florida/legoland-hotel/themed-rooms/kingdom/).
> 
> Special thanks to medievalraven for beta-ing! This chapter needed serious revisions, and it wouldn't have happened without her!


End file.
